New Delhi, May 09: Government has advised television companies looking for uplinking facilities from the country to apply afresh as per the provisions of the revised guidelines issued in March this year, Information and Broadcasting Minister Ravi Shanker Prasad said today. In a statement on the calling attention on foreign direct investment in electronic media in the Rajya Sabha, Prasad said the revised guidelines permit foreign equity holding in the applicant-company upto 26 per cent of the total paid up capital.

It also required the company to be registered under the Companies Act 1956 and the majority of directors, CEOs and the news editors to be "resident Indians", he said.

The permission for usage of facilities/infrastructure for live news/footage collection and transmission irrespective of the technology used, would be available to only those channels which were uplinked from India and the company has to ensure that its news and current affairs content providers were accredited with the PIB, the minister said. "It has been the constant endeavour of the government to closely monitor and review the policy at periodic intervals so as to keep pace with the changing economic scenario and globalisation, while simultaneously balancing the need for taking care of security concerns", Prasad said.

Bureau Report